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The grieving process reflections
Grieving and loss quizlet
Grieving and loss quizlet
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Occasions of grief, loss, death and trauma are profoundly life altering. In memoirs of grief and bereavement, we see this again and again. Often memoirs of grief do little to paint an intimate portrait of the person who has died rather, the focus is generally centred on the perspective of the narrator. Invariably memoirs provide an account of the profound way grief alters their perception and experience of life after. They capture the psychosocial transition and identity crisis of grief, the disequilibrium triggered by incomprehensible and senseless loss of life and the immense change that ultimately comes to pass when navigating unchartered waters of bereavement. A familiar response to the death of a person the bereaved was close to is to …show more content…
Intimately experiencing loss through the death of a loved one, challenges close held beliefs about existence by forcing a confrontation with one’s own mortality. A Grief Observed (1961) where prominent author and academic C.S. Lewis endures a devastating crisis of faith, contains evidence supporting Marris’s comment that the central crisis of grief is a loss of self. C.S. Lewis experiences a tumultuous struggle to reconcile his spiritual beliefs with the senseless loss of life and seeming cruelty of his wife’s death. Overcome with grief, he flirts with blasphemy, naming his once beloved and trusted god ‘Cosmic Sadist’, ‘spiteful imbecile’ (p. 27) and ‘Eternal Vivisector’ (p. 34). In his memoir of the ordeal C.S. Lewis writes: “Death only reveals the vacuity that was already there” (1961, p. 25). Grief leaves C.S. Lewis stricken with doubt and questioning his fundamental beliefs. He calls out his less than steadfast faith as being fragile as a house of cards. Along with the loss of his wife, C.S. Lewis also lost himself, throwing his very identity as a man of unshakable faith, into …show more content…
Consequently, when a relationship is severed by death the feeling can be that the survivor’s identity has been sabotaged. Geiger captures the subsequent identity crisis of death in her memoir The Thin Time: when my husband died it was as if I also died. Over the 30 years we had been married my identity had become so interwoven with his that I hardly knew where he ended and I began. My own death, I thought, was perhaps the price I had to pay for deeply loving another — a suttee of the self on his funeral pyre. All the safety and security, all the sense of common purpose, meaning, and identity vanished. (2012, p. 2). Hence, the story of grief memoirs often observes a drive to reconstruct an identity that has been profoundly shattered by loss. As Fowler identifies, “the grief memoirist… seeks to make sense of the loss and to compose a new post-loss identity while recovering at least part of the former self” (2007, p. 529). Transformation, arising from grief is central to memoirs of loss in the restructuring of identity that occurs as the bereaved adjust to an unfamiliar new world. In the words of Bray, it is “the human potential for growth in the struggle though loss” (2013, p. 890) that is explored most frequently in grief
The interpretations of what comes after death may vary greatly across literature, but one component remains constant: there will always be movement. In her collection Native Guard, Natasha Trethewey discusses the significance, permanence and meaning of death often. The topic is intimate and personal in her life, and inescapable in the general human experience. Part I of Native Guard hosts many of the most personal poems in the collection, and those very closely related to the death of Trethewey’s mother, and the exit of her mother’s presence from her life. In “Graveyard Blues”, Trethewey examines the definition of “home” as a place of lament, in contrast to the comforting meaning in the epitaph beginning Part I, and the significance
Tuesdays with Morrie is a book about and old college sociology professor who gives us insight not only on death, but also on other topics important in our lives like fear, marriage, and forgiveness while in his last days being on Earth. Using symbolic interactionism I will analyze one of Morrie’s experiences; while also explaining why I chose such an experience and why I felt it was all connected. Seven key concepts will be demonstrated as well to make sure you can understand how powerful Morrie’s messages truly are. The one big message I took from Morrie was to learn how to live and not let anything hold you back
Sittser, G. L. (2004). A grace disguised: how the soul grows through loss (Expanded ed.). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan.
The funeral was supposed to be a family affair. She had not wanted to invite so many people, most of them strangers to her, to be there at the moment she said goodbye. Yet, she was not the only person who had a right to his last moments above the earth, it seemed. Everyone, from the family who knew nothing of the anguish he had suffered in his last years, to the colleagues who saw him every day but hadn’t actually seen him, to the long-lost friends and passing acquaintances who were surprised to find that he was married, let alone dead, wanted to have a last chance to gaze upon him in his open coffin and say goodbye.
The author initially uses words with negative connotation, such “wild,” “storm of grief,” and “sank into her soul” (1), to suggest a normal reaction to the death of a loved one.
Overcoming the grief that is felt after losing a loved one is a physically and mentally agonizing task. According to Dr. Christina Hibbert, a clinical psychologist who graduated from the California School of Professional Psychology, three main stages of grief include anger, depression and acceptance. Each one of these emotions can be seen in William Shakespeare’s Hamlet and The Descendants (2011, Payne) as the artists explore the effects of grief and the different emotional responses that one can have due to the loss of a loved one. Additionally, in Ismail Kadare’s Broken April, the Berisha family feels the sufferance that is associated with unexpected death, as well as the various temperamental reactions that one will have after losing a loved one. Each of these works of art represent a powerful example of the stages that one will go through after feeling the intense sorrow that is connected with death, as well as the unavoidable effects of grief.
Imagine that the person you love most in the world dies. How would you cope with the loss? Death and grieving is an agonizing and inevitable part of life. No one is immune from death’s insidious and frigid grip. Individuals vary in their emotional reactions to loss. There is no right or wrong way to grieve (Huffman, 2012, p.183), it is a melancholy ordeal, but a necessary one (Johnson, 2007). In the following: the five stages of grief, the symptoms of grief, coping with grief, and unusual customs of mourning with particular emphasis on mourning at its most extravagant, during the Victorian era, will all be discussed in this essay (Smith, 2014).
The first section of the book gives very fixed expressions of grief. In the poem “What Grief Does”, Anderson is describing the feeling of grief in detail. She talks about how grief is a part of you forever and can drive you insane. She writes, “grief is the power of certain madness.../ This will never go away. It is your middle name” (Anderson 6). This explains that no matter how hard you try, you can't completely get rid of your grief. Grief causes you stress and depression that is hard to overcome. This poem describes grief in a very simple and comprehensive way, showing a very simple form of grief observed by the author.
Kaufman’s chapter on “Transforming Time” presented many truths most of do not want to think about. Even though we all know the inevitably of death; most of us cling to life. This is not an unusual phenomenon, but what is compelling is the perception of death. Allowing your loved one to die a “good” death verses a “bad” one. The author presented two illustrations of families faced with a loved one who is dying. One such illustration was Mrs. Brown and her husband. Mrs. Brown who had “been married fifty-six years” noted her husband was “the only thing I have.” (page 111) In making this statement she acknowledged that she wanted to hold on to him for as long as she could. The perplexing element arises, when asked by the medical team, what life sustaining measures to take; her response was “I’ll leave it to God’s will.” Unfortunately, for a medical team this is not a definitive response. The uncertainty of what to do still lingers.
Roxanne Roberts, the author of The Grieving Never Ends, coveys the psychological scarring event of her father's suicide with her powerful use of imagery. She effectively evokes sorrowful emotion with her structure of the similes and metaphors added throughout the article. Robert's introduction consists of the simile, “The blood was like Jell-O. That is what the blood gets like after you die, before they tidy up"(1). The author's decision to open her narrative with a graphic description leaves an impact on the audience. In addition, the metaphors used in the article makes the reader comprehend the grief that Roberts had and still has to experience. The excerpt, "Think of your life as a can of white paint. Each significant experience adds a tiny
The characters in Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones are faced with the difficult task of overcoming the loss of Susie, their daughter and sister. Jack, Abigail, Buckley, and Lindsey each deal with the loss differently. However, it is Susie who has the most difficulty accepting the loss of her own life. Several psychologists separate the grieving process into two main categories: intuitive and instrumental grievers. Intuitive grievers communicate their emotional distress and “experience, express, and adapt to grief on a very affective level” (Doka, par. 27). Instrumental grievers focus their attention towards an activity, whether it is into work or into a hobby, usually relating to the loss (Doka par. 28). Although each character deals with their grief differently, there is one common denominator: the reaction of one affects all.
Bryant, “America’s foremost poet” (Muller 1), utilizes this concept immensely in the construction of the classic poem on life and death, “Thanatopsis.” As outlined in Britannica’s article on Bryant, he grew up a strict Puritan before “he rejected Puritan dogma for Deism; thereafter he was a Unitarian” (Brittanica). This change in doctrinal views is evident throughout “Thanatopsis.” “Nature” in this poem could also be characterized as a single-being God, which as a teen Bryant began to believe, opposed to his Puritan background(Brittanica). However, the pioneer of American poetry strove to make a commentary about the death of man in a way that does not make his religious beliefs obvious except to the most ardent readers. Why would someone want to purposefully disguise his religious association? John Bigelow, Bryant’s biographer, recollected that he “used to say that a gentleman should never talk of his love affairs or of his religion” (Bigelow 280). One could theorize, that this poet characterized religious experiences as pertinent to merely individuals. Thus him imposing his religious views on others would somewhat limit their own individuality in terms of religion. Therefore Bryant strove to “look at death” from as objective view as possible. So while he still spoke of an all-knowing and seeing being, it is portrayed as
Since the day the first man was created and then destroyed, a theory about life has been made. Everyday people take their lives for granted. But after they have faced mortal loss or life-threatening situations, their attitude towards life changes. They soon come to understand that the gift of life is to be appreciated and not taken for granted. Yulisa Amadu Maddy and T.S. Eliot are two writers who through their literature prove that death can change a person’s outlook on life.
It is often said that as a human, we die two deaths. One when our heart stops beating, and another one when our name is uttered for the final time. One is your death as a human, and the other is your death as a distinct human. It can be said though, that in that time between deaths, it’s better to be remembered by the positive things you had said and done, rather than the negative. People want to be remembered not by their failures and the bridges they burned, but by their successes and the bonds they made. Health is what prevents our first death, but the bonds we made prevent our second. Bonds are not exclusive to people, though. In Pablo Neruda’s poem A Dog Has Died, he discusses the death of a companion, and the special relationship held between a pet and its owner, and how it goes beyond that bond which can be made between people.
We all know that there are hard times in life that we all have to endure. One example of this recently was when my brother Caleb and his fiancée Hannah were driving my car to my grandparents house a week or so ago. I was working at the Health Club when suddenly I got a phone call asking if I had heard what happened. Soon I learned that on the way to my grandparent’s house, my brother had swerved off the road and over corrected, causing him to hit a guard rail and roll my car down the highway going sixty five miles per hour. This whole story came as a complete shock to me, thankfully they are both okay, but my car, that is a different story. Anyway, this whole situation made me think of what would have happened if I were in their shoes, and what would have happened if they wouldn’t have been so lucky. In the same way, Thomas Gray, the author of “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard,” writes about how he imagines peoples’ lives that are dead, and then imagines his own and how people will think of him after he passes. In Gary’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard,” there are three messages learned about death.